


Ghost in the Land of the Living

by Dirthera



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, F/M, Here Lies the Abyss, Post-Here Lies the Abyss, The Fade
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-16
Updated: 2016-10-20
Packaged: 2018-08-22 20:34:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8300011
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dirthera/pseuds/Dirthera
Summary: After escaping the nightmare demon, Hawke stumbles through the fade, trying to find some way out and back to her loved ones. One in particular. She finds a way to see him again, though it's not in the way she expected.





	1. Chapter 1

Hawke was running. Nothing mattered but the air in her lungs, the unpredictable, infuriating, often less than solid ground her feet were pounding away at, and the nightmare demon far behind her. Or, she hoped it was far behind her. She couldn’t be sure. She had half a mind to turn back, punch the overgrown bug in its face, and try to defeat it once and for all, but the reasonable, calm part of her was telling her she would not survive that.

The fire in her chest wanted to try anyway.

She could no longer hear her sister screaming in pain, could no longer hear the insidious whispering telling her what would happen to Fenris now that she was gone, could no longer see small demons looking like him, dying, dying, dead, at her hand, at a slaver’s hand, at Danarius’s hand. That had to be a good sign. She was getting farther away from the thing’s effects, and she would keep going until she found a way out. Back to Fenris. He would be fine and she would find him. She would find him, and then there wouldn’t be a damn thing in the world that would be able to pry them apart again.

She resumed doing the one thing that had brought her any sense of relief in this place, cursing the Inquisitor’s name, and kept going, only occasionally stumbling, trying to keep upright despite her muscles straining and screaming.

She didn’t know how long she had been running, she didn’t know where she was, she had no way to tell time or place in the confusing and green-tinted place that was the fade. She could only hope it had been enough as she felt her legs give out from underneath her and fell to the suddenly incredibly solid ground.

She stayed conscious, though her mind seemed not to want to cooperate with her. There was no falling unconscious in the fade, she knew, there was no sleep in the realm of dreams. And so she stayed there, on the ground, awake but not aware, for only a few minutes, for a whole year, for an hour, for three weeks, she had no way to tell, the fade being such as it was.

But finally, after what felt like an eternity and yet no time at all, she picked herself up off the ground again and looked around.

A road. She was on a road. Green-tinted and hazy and strange, but yet… something about it seemed familiar.

The fade reflected the real world, she knew. They’d had to retrace their steps to reach the rift in the fade, it had been the same place in the fade as it had been in their world, so it had to be the same here. She would retrace her steps and find her way out that way.

She had no other plan, no other ideas. And so she picked the direction that seemed most right, picked up one of her daggers, which had fallen out of its sheath and to the ground when she fell, and began walking.

Hawke didn’t know how far she had walked when she reached the ghost of a great castle, towering, new and old and ruined and whole, a place that was everything all at once, a place that was a ghost and yet the most solid thing she had ever seen.

There were great, towering walls, ghosts of people entering and exiting, living and dying and fighting and loving within those walls, everything happening at once, a man dying in the same place as a woman was going into labor, not at the same time or even remotely close to each other in history, one was an elf and one was human, but still, it all overlapped here in the fade, everything happening, everything happening, everything…

Fenris. Fenris was entering the gate. He was so far away, but she could see him, his walk, his hunch, his demeanor, it was him, she would move heaven and earth to see him again, and now he was here, and she had to get to him, had to touch him, hold him, had to…

And he was gone.

Hawke’s heart was beating hard, panic and need and adrenaline building inside her, where was he, she needed to find him, talk to him, tell him she was alive, hold him again, she needed…

“Greetings,” a voice said from behind her. Hawke startled, all the adrenaline in her finding an outlet when she instinctively grabbed her daggers from her back and brought them up in front of her as she swiveled to face the newcomer.

Her knives ended up resting at the elf’s throat, and the look on his face was simply amused. He brushed away the knives, and after a brief hesitation, she let him. She had seen this man before, she knew… somewhere, somehow, he was familiar.

Long black dreadlocks were cascading down his back and shoulders, held away from his face with a metal bit shaped like some sort of wild animal. He looked thin and agile, his robes were loose and seemed to allow for easy movement, and in his hand was a long, wooden mage’s staff. She had seen him somewhere before, she knew it. She just couldn’t place him.

“You are Hawke,” he said, interrupting her attempts at identifying him. She nodded curtly, knowing that if he had survived a previous meeting with her he probably wasn’t malicious, taking comfort in that. He continued. “You stayed here to help your friends escape. You want to go back.”

It was not a question, but Hawke nodded anyway, face stony and controlled. “Want” was the wrong word, this was not some small thing she fancied at moment. Seeing the man she loved now when he was so close was something she needed, something more necessary than the heavy air in the fade, more critical than the continued beating of her own heart. But she did not tell the man this.

“I need to go back. There are people who need me.” Years of practice let her keep her voice steady, even as she threatened to break apart.

The man smiled, a pitying, sad smile. “You can’t,” he said. When Hawke started to protest, he elaborated. “You’ve been gone longer than your frail human body could survive without sleep or sustenance. If you were to exit the fade at this point, it would simply crumble. Turn to dust. You cannot return.”

Hawke’s heart sank. Her throat closed up. Her breathing slowed to the point where it was almost gone. Her feet felt as though they might give in again. Still she kept her poker face in place, determined not to let this man see her weakness, hoping he could not tell from the signs she could not control.

The man was looking at her still, his head cocked to the side, a curious glint in his eyes. “What will you do, then?” he asked. “Since you cannot go back?” It seemed like some sort of test, but Hawke was violently apathetic to this man’s opinion of her. She turned away from him and towards the castle, knife still grasped tightly in one hand, keeping her grounded, her face still stony and controlled.

“This is Skyhold?” she asked, voice deceptively steady. She knew she was right, but even so, she needed it confirmed.

“Yes.”

“And everything that has happened, everything that is happening there, is reflected here?”

“Yes.” Hawke was quiet, considering, and the man seemed to take it as a quiet question. “Skyhold is ancient, and much has happened here to damage what you know as the veil. It is very thin here, and so the reflections of the other side are remarkably clear.”

Hawke kept considering for another moment, gaze steady on the great castle, making a decision. Then she looked up at the elf again, nodding slowly. “Then this is where I will stay. Perhaps I’ll catch another glimpse of him.” Her voice finally cracked, and she was almost angry at herself for it. She angrily blinked away tears, a result of frustration both at her uncooperative voice and her unavoidable fate.

The elf gave her a long, considering look. It seemed to last minutes, years, hours, weeks, time was nothing, but he finally spoke again.

“I will help you,” he finally said, looking almost like he was regretting this decision already. “So you can see what is happening now, in our time, so that you can see him one last time.”

Hawke stared at him, disbelievingly, skeptically, knowing that accepting the offer of any fade creature, however humanlike (or elflike, she supposed), was dangerous. She had almost decided not to do it when she spotted another flash of white hair, gone as soon as it had appeared, like a fireball sprung to life and immediately doused by water. Something welled up in her chest, fire and need, nearly swallowing any shred of reason still left in her exhausted and adrenaline-fueled mind.

Still, she knew better. She had been taught better. She forced her feelings down and focused instead on safety.

“How do I know you’re not a demon?” she asked. “How do I know this isn’t some plot to get yourself out of the fade?”

The elf didn’t look offended as he explained. “I will not be accompanying you out of the fade, and so will have no opportunity to exit this place by way of you. Other than that, I have no proof to provide for my intentions. As for how you can know I am not a demon, all I can offer is my word.”

Hawke considered for a moment, caution slowly giving way for that fire and need inside of her. She nodded slowly, then asked, “Why would you want to help me?”“You humans say you will be rewarded for your good actions when you die, do you not? You have helped many, Champion. Some of which I have met. You have touched the lives of many, and that deserves some form of recognition.”

Hawke looked at the elf for a moment, weighing her options, then nodded. The decision had been made.

“All right, let’s do this thing.” She paused, then asked, “Walk me through what exactly will happen?”

The elf nodded. “The magic is complicated, and so I will not bore you with the details. Simply put, your consciousness, what you would call the soul, will be allowed passage through the veil. You will feel as though you have corporeal form, you will be able to see your own body if you look down, but no one else will be able to see you or hear you.

“You will be able to see what is happening at this moment, but you will not be able to communicate. And you will not be able to stay for very long.”

Hawke nodded. She would be able to see him again. That was all that mattered.

“Close your eyes.” Hawke did, and soon after felt a hand touch her forehead. A moment later her body seemed to turn to liquid, and she almost panicked before the sensation stopped as soon as it had begun.

She opened her eyes.


	2. Chapter 2

The castle gates were ahead of her, and she could just barely make out a shock of white hair, and the man it was connected to, rushing through them. Before she could even form a coherent thought she was running, her legs carrying her where she needed to be.

Fenris was walking quickly, and by the time she reached him he was halfway up the majestic staircase leading up to the main building, grey stone looming over the courtyard. She passed him and swiveled, walking backwards so she could look at his face as he walked on.

He looked past her, not batting an eye.

Hawke ignored the stabbing pain in her chest, telling herself that this was what the strange elf had told her would happen, that this should not have been a surprise. She tried to press it down and ignore the wetness pressing at her eyes, finally threatening to break through after keeping a perfectly stoic face for such a long time, finally threatening to break her down now that she was finally here.

At least he didn’t look sad, she told herself. At least he didn’t look broken, or devastated, or angry, or crushed. At least…

 _No one had told him yet_. The thought crashed into her, knocking the breath out of her, fire burned up her heart, smoke was choking her, everything was light and bright and colors and she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t see, couldn’t focus, couldn’t…

A loud thump resounded in Hawke’s ears, but no one else seemed to look up. When she extracted her hand from the wall she could see split skin, blood, and what was probably going to become some pretty bad bruising. She didn’t care, though, the pain was grounding, and she had gotten to hit someone. As useless as it had been, it had felt good. It had made her feel better. She could breathe again, if just barely.

Hawke took a moment to collect herself, drew a deep breath, and turned around towards where Fenris had gone.

She spotted Fenris a few meters ahead of her and was just about to follow when she heard a familiar voice from her right.

“Broody? What are you doing here already?”

Hawke could see Fenris turn, could see the questions in his eyes, could see Varric noticing as well, could see confusion filling his face.

“You were expecting me?” Fenris asked, and the crease in Varric’s brow grew.

“You didn’t get the letter?” Varric asked, and Fenris shook his head. “Then why are you here?”

“When Hawke left… I understood why she would want to do this on her own, why she would want me to stay behind. But I won’t let her do this alone. I need to be at her side.” Fenris’s gaze swept the great hall, as if expecting Hawke to round a corner any moment, and Hawke wanted to scream, wanted to hit something, wanted to kill something, she would do anything to be able to do as he expected and join him in that moment.

Fenris seemed to realize something about Varric’s last sentence, as his eyes narrowed and confusion swept across his face. “What letter?” he asked, and Varric closed his eyes.

“I… think you’re gonna want to sit down for this.” Fenris didn’t change his expression other than to narrow his eyes, but Hawke could read the dread and apprehension and borderline panic in every movement he made, in the tense set of his shoulders, in the wildness in his eyes. He knew something was wrong, she could see that he knew, and it felt like something was squeezing her heart in a vice-like grip.

“Where is she?” Fenris’s voice was low, desperate, pleading, and Varric was looking at him with such soft sympathy, and Hawke wanted to scream.

After a moment, Varric answered. “Someone had to stay in the fade, cover everyone else’s escape. Sacrifice themselves for us. Hawke told us to go.”

Fenris froze, and the vice around Hawke’s heart tightened. “Varric,” his voice was a low growl, but beneath it was fear. Every word was enunciated clearly. “Where. Is. She.”

 “She’s still in there. She’s still in the fade. But Fenris…”

Fenris was still for a single, painful moment, but when he spoke again something seemed to have changed inside of him.

“You let her stay!” His voice was strained and angry and horrified all at once. “You let her get herself killed! You let her do this!”

Fenris was snarling, leaning over the dwarf, glowing, his markings bright as Hawke had ever seen them, she could see it clearly on his face, he was _hurting_ , and there was nothing Hawke could fight to make things better, there was nothing she could do, nothing she could punch, nothing she could kill to remove that look from his face, and she couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, it all just _hurt_.

Varric smiled half-heartedly. “No one _let_ Hawke do anything. You know that. She did what she wanted, and damn the consequences.”

She couldn’t recall her brain giving the order to move, but in a few short moments she was standing between them, Varric at her back, facing Fenris, looking at his face, into his eyes, almost breaking as he looked right through her. He didn’t see her. He didn’t know she was there. She was air.

Fenris was still tensed up, ready to pounce, his eyes flickering from Varric to the room, looking desperate for something, someone to blame, something to take the brunt of his anger and sadness and frustration, some way to unload these feelings through aggression, teeth bared, markings flashing, heart raw.

She needed to be that person for him. She needed to be there with him. She needed him to see her. The thought was desperate and all-encompassing, almost burying her with the force of it.

“Fenris…” Varric began, but Hawke didn’t want to heard it, didn’t want to hear anything, just needed to be listened to, needed him to hear _her_. And so she drowned him out with her own noise.

Words began flowing out of her mouth at an unbelievable volume, desperate and horrifying and bleeding words, needing to be heard, needing to be noticed, but no one even blinked, and she couldn’t stop, wouldn’t stop, didn’t stop, the words kept flowing, and she couldn’t breathe, she needed him to hear her, see her, understand her, needed to be with him, but he still didn’t see her, didn’t hear her, didn’t know she was there, didn’t _know_.

 _“I’m here! I’m right in front of you why won’t you just see me just hear me just know just I’m here you need to know I’m here you have to know I’m here!”_ Her words descended into an angry warbled mess, and Fenris kept talking, even though she was there, she was talking to him, but he didn’t see her, he didn’t…

“Where is the Inquisitor?” He almost shouted the question, glowing and dangerous, and when Varric shook his head he turned his back to the dwarf, and Hawke could see his eyes search the room, starting with the big throne at the end of the hall.

_“Don’t turn your back to me, I’m here! I’m right here! Just look at me!”_

“This isn’t the Inquisitor’s fault, you know that.”

Fenris turned to face Varric again, and almost shouted “ _then whose is it?_ ” with a voice as pleading as it was aggressive, and Hawke wanted to burn the world down, wanted to fight death itself, wanted to do anything and everything but all she could do was make sound that no one would hear, punch things that no one would see, listen to this conversation that should never be happening. She was losing volume, her anger still bright and suffocating but her voice giving in, she needed to be heard, needed to be seen, needed…

“She loved you.”

The three words sliced through her anger and desperation in a heartbeat, tearing her fight from between clutched fingers, leaving her a burnt out mess. She looked at Fenris and saw the words had had the same effect on him, and tears threatened to well from the corners of her eyes. She blinked them back angrily.

Varric continued. “And you know being loved by Hawke was no small thing. She would have burned the world down for you.”

Fenris just nodded, looking as empty as Hawke felt, and closed his eyes. A moment later he reopened them, looking more steady than he had before.

“I need some air,” he said, and then, more hesitantly, “Thank you. For telling me.” He then turned on his heel and walked through a door seemingly at random. Hawke cast one last look at Varric over her shoulder, taking in his face one last time, knowing she would likely never see it again, and saying a silent goodbye. Then she followed.

* * *

Fenris seemed to be walking at random, and it took some time before he threw open a door and was finally met with fresh air.

He walked to the edge of the parapet and looked out across where the mountains reached their jagged fingers into the sky, and Hawke looked at him, and he still didn’t see her, and she knew she should feel sad, but she had felt so desperately sad for too long already and now all she felt was nothing, but still the sadness welled in her throat, she couldn’t feel it at all and felt it too much all at once, and he kept looking on, and she kept looking at him, and she saw where they were and she couldn’t breathe.

The northeastern corner of the wall surrounding Skyhold.

Did he know that this was where she had stood, all those weeks ago? Did he know that this had been where she had sat and composed letters she never sent, did he know that this was where she had looked at the mountains just like he was doing now, that this was where she had missed him?

Did he know this was where she had thought of nothing but him, looking off to the northwest where she knew he was still attacking slave caravans on the Tevinter border, in the last moments before leaving for Adamant?

Did he know this was where she had promised herself she would come back to him?

Tears welled up in her eyes, and the need to hold around him one last time came back. She knew it was impossible, knew it was something she would never be able to do again, and so she instead stepped carefully around him so she stood facing him, looking into eyes that looked through her.

She drank in his face, unguarded and vulnerable, beautiful, hers. The eyes she had met so many times, that had flashed in anger and softened in love, that had drunk her in as she was drinking him in, the eyes that were now looking past her. The nose she had landed soft, teasing kisses on, the forehead she had rested her own against, the mouth she had bickered with and kissed, the cheeks she had held between cupped palms, the jawline she had traced so many times, she committed it all to memory, knowing she would never see it again, knowing that this was… that this was where she left him. That this was the end of their story.

She took a deep breath to steady herself, then began speaking.

“This… this is stupid. I know you can’t hear me. I know that. But I… you know I love you. I don’t really need to tell you that. You know.” She sighed, looking down at her boots. “Maker, I hope you know.” Raising her head to look into his eyes again, she continued. “I am yours, as you have always said you are mine.

“I promised to come back to you, and…” her voice cracked, but she powered on, sucking in deep breaths to steady herself. “I failed. I’m sorry. If I could come back, I would, if there was anything I could do… I would tear down the world if it meant I could be by your side. But that’s not how this works. That’s not possible.”

She took another deep breath, trying to suppress the tears running down her face, failing miserably, choking down a sob, then continuing.

“I love you. I always will.”

She closed her eyes, and her voice dropped to a whisper.

“Goodbye.”

Then

she slowly

faded.

 

* * *

When she opened her eyes again and blinked away her tears, the strange elf was sitting on a green rock several miles away, close enough to touch. When he saw she was back, he stood and walked toward her, reaching her in three quick steps.

“Thank you.”

The man simply smiled at her and nodded in response, and something clicked into place in her mind.

“I know you.” Hawke didn’t have the energy to sound excited, but it was close. “You look different here but… You’re Solas, aren’t you? One of the Inquisitor’s companions.”

Solas nodded, and seemed about to respond when Hawke interrupted him. “You can bring Fenris a message.”

It wasn’t a question, but Solas nodded anyway.

Hawke considered her words for a few moments, weighing what she wanted to say, settling on the simplest options.

“Tell Varric what happened. Tell him… tell him goodbye from me. And thank you.”

She hesitated for a moment before continuing. “And Fenris. He…” She sighed. “Tell him I never wanted to leave him. He knows the rest.”

Then she turned her back on him and began walking.

“Where are you going?” Solas asked from behind her as she walked, more conversational and curious than concerned.

“I don’t care what you think of my chances, I’m finding a way out of here.”

She didn’t turn around, knowing the look on his face would be pitying. She knew there probably was no way for her to get out, but she didn’t care. She would rather break her own heart trying and failing than sit and do nothing.

There was no response, and so she kept walking.

She would wander until she found a way out or a demon she wasn’t strong enough to defeat, she decided. She would do anything to return to the ones who had lost her.

To the ones she’d lost.

To Fenris.

She kept walking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading, and I hope you liked it! Some notes:
> 
> I am totally on board the "Solas looks like his concept art in the fade, because that was what he looked like when he was younger" train. Yes.
> 
> Ok so I know I used the plural "some notes" but that was all I had. Anyway, I hope you liked it, and kudos and comments are always appreciated!


End file.
